Ti gallery hosting show of Middlebury artists

Sally DeLarm Rypkema, Mary Jo Boyd and Ellen Affel enjoy the offerings of the Middlebury Studio School at the Ti Arts gallery in Ticonderoga.

Photo by Tim Rowland

TICONDEROGA | Ti Arts, located in a bright, airy gallery on Montcalm Street, is featuring a number of shows this summer, and the current exhibit, which runs through July 19, features work in canvas and clay from the Middlebury, Vt., Studio School.

The shows come under the appreciative eyes of a steady stream of downtown visitors, many of whom are in town to see Fort Ticonderoga or the Star Trek Original Series Set Tour, said coordinator Seddon Beaty.

“We are getting a lot of people here for Star Trek,” she said. “It’s become quite an economic driver.”

Right on cue, a couple from Bangor, Maine, entered the studio to look around.

“Star Trek was what brought us here, but we like history too,” said Pencil Boone, who was in town with his wife Martha for the Fourth of July festivities.

The gallery featured 18 members who exhibit their art and volunteer their time to man (or woman) the store.

“Our mission is to bring arts to the community,” Beaty said. Operating in donated space, it formed in 2008 and merged in 2014 with The Downtown Gallery. Ti Arts also hosts lectures, classes, and festivals, as well as offering community outreach and scholarships.

The members exhibit their work, which is impressive both in its quality and in its scope of subject matter and media.

The Middlebury Studio School show features the work of students and teachers at the school, which formed to keep arts alive in the community in 2009, after the closing of the Frog Hollow Craft Center.

Over the past nine years, MSS has steadily grown and has increased offerings of studio classes and workshops in painting, drawing, ceramics and crafts. The school also sponsors art camps. Its website is middleburystudioschool.org.

Beaty said that Ti Arts, whose members come primarily from the shores of lakes George and Champlain, is looking to publicize local artists.

“We have a lot of artists here and a lot of musicians,” she said. “There are all these people here who are hidden all over the place.”

Beaty said the gallery wants the public to know about the artists, but the artists, of which Beaty herself is one, also want people to know about the gallery.

“We continually have people who walk in and say, ‘I didn’t know you were here, how long have you been here?’” she said.